Occupy Flash…really?

November 22nd 2011

Occupy Flash is probably one of the dumbest movement I’ve seen in a while. Don’t get me wrong, I fully understand that choosing Flash for web development is not exactly the best choice you can make. The problem is that this campaign is totally useless and it’s probably more harmful than good.

So bad

You can’t simply start a campaign stating that Flash has become useless and then ask the user to uninstall it from his computer, this will NOT make a better world. Truth is, Flash is not holding anyone or anything back. You (as a web developer) don’t want to use it? Then just don’t, this will be a much stronger statement than uninstalling it from your mom’s computer.

It’s one thing to try to explain to someone technical the strain that Flash can put on a computer, but trying to explain this to a non-technical person just won’t work. Flash is still being used quite a lot here and there and HTML5 fallbacks (for the lack of a better word) are not always present.

Users don’t care.

What’s the point of asking people to uninstall Flash…really? It will only make the experience worse and in no way improve it. It’s true that it’s sometime needed to ask people to upgrade. And upgrade is the keyword, if you take Internet Explorer 6 or 7 for example, these are really hurtful for the web and this really hold us back. But Flash? It’s optional! You can be sure that if you uninstall it today you’ll be pissed as hell.

Rebrand…please, or just die.

We do not need another movement to raise awareness around Flash, the ones who can really make a difference are the ones who make the web. These people already know all the ups and downs of Flash and if they don’t they shouldn’t be in the industry.

Just work the other way around, instead of asking users to uninstall Flash, ask developers to stop supporting it, but then again, we all know it.

Ok Flash is not a norm, it is a proprietary brand of Adobe, etc.
Ok it’s not good for SEO or for accebility
Ok some flash website are just terrible (but some other are the best on the web see thefwa.com and a lot of html website are also so bad)

But I can found a lot of drawback with HTML to if I want. Each technology has its advantages and drawbacks.

But what and why Macromedia and Adobe do they do in 90′ and 00′ deceny with Flash ?

The invent a technology which permit to fill the lack of evolution of web and HTML for last 10 years ! Thanks to W3C and Microsoft, web evolve asa turtle speed for 10 years since HTML4 or IE6 release.
Flash support time and vector graphic in pages and a lot of other things like video, microphone/webcam, mouse event, etc.
This was not the case 10 years ago and even today you can’t offer on the web a lot of game or application like vidéo chat without flash at all ! The only other way was in java applet or active X, no comment.

Today we can do more and more other in different ways (with jquery or html5) and then people throw stone and tomatoes on Flash… So easy to do it now when Flash can be replaced by public norm.

We should thanks flash for a lot of concepts and evolutions, not throw im in trash bin. Even today video player are so better with flash than HTML5 and video is so important on the web.

As a web developer who used to work exclusively in Flash, I’ve had to adopt to the market and the crys of “Flash is bad” and “when will Flash just die”. I now work almost exclusively with HTML/CSS/Javascript simply because my clients want websites that work on iOS devices.

THAT’S THE ONLY REASON I’M STUCK WORKING WITH THIS PRIMITIVE SYSTEM!!!!

My days are now spent trying to get my websites looking the same across all browsers, both desktop and mobile. This wasn’t an issue I had with Flash. Browser support for HTML and CSS (nevermind HTML5 and CSS3) is absolutely all over the place. You never really know what’s going to happen until you run the code on every possible device. My websites are also much bigger (in KB) with the overhead of jquery and having everything saved as PNG’s and Animated GIF’s (which don’t run well in iOS browsers anyway). People who say that Flash should die aren’t web developers or don’t understand what Flash can do. Flash will give you enough rope to hang yourself, HTML just forced you to constantly review your code for cross-browser support. I miss Flash.

The biggest, biggest pro for Flash is that no matter what browser you load your site in, you always know exactly what your site will look like. The translation of css/html differences in firefox, chrome, IE, safari, etc etc do not apply.. If you design a site entirely in Flash you don’t need to test it in forty-five browsers on six different operating systems to be thorough, you test it once on your computer.

Also, many people are so misinformed. They believe since HTML5 and CSS3 are iOS compatible, that it is fully compatible and replaces Flash, which isn’t true. Canvas has the same power consumption issues, CPU problems, and incompatibility with mobile devices Flash has.. difference is flash is either compatible or not.. HTML5 is pseudo compatible.

I’m a big proponent of leaving flash, but i see it’s weaknesses, and strengths; however, it will be a long long time before we can have sites portably the same as we do at home. Simply put, animation and effects drain battery, which unless you have a briefcase battery pack that comes with your cell you won’t be seeing that any time soon.

so I’m pro html5, but I’m a professional, full-time flash programmer and developer.. i see value in knowing both, using both when applicable.

Why kill flash? Surely all technologies have pluses and minuses? Why not pick the most appropriate technology for the job? I understand that flash is proprietary technology owned by Adobe whereas HTML, JavaScript and CSS are all ‘standards’ based and not owned by any one company. Perhaps this is why there is so much cost to producing a cross-browser, cross-platform web site using the non-proprietary technologies. The best solution, perhaps, would be for Adobe to make flash open source. Can anyone actually see this happening?

I won’t ever quit using Flash, I’m clearly trying to learn HTML5, CSS3 and JQuery but I won’t ever stop surprising myself with all the possibilities Flash still offers even if Actionscript3 makes me cry in pain every time I don’t have a clue of how to fix my issues when they occur {and to be totally honest also all the other scripting languages are so better intuitive than AS3!}.
Flash still gives me the wonderful opportunity to completely express myself with it, I use a Movies Director’s approach with it getting the maximum satisfaction and nothing compares yet to the smooth animations and contents fruition Flash allows even on old systems {not all web users can have the ultra gaming notebook or a last generation’s iPhone… if you wanna create wonder in African children they won’t care how good you are with coding… a Flash animation’s all they need. I’m not using this example casually but just because of a project ‘m developing just for children in Africa and other “poor” zones of this world}… some CSS3 and JQuery solutions badly effect on CPU and general performance not less than Flash does.
I don’t know what really made Apple make such a drastic choice preventing the use of Flash in their portable devices… if this is just a matter of proprietary-technology and non-proprietary ones I really don’t care. Flash has a huge community of developers with great talent and capabilities, people whose work made Flash an astonishing instrument. I started to follow Flash since its origins and the improvements made during the years while HTML was remaining under the line for years compared to Flash, I grew up with it as web designer and as artist. I used Flash also as alternative to Photoshop, Fireworks and Illustrator because of the creative freedom and intuitive approach. I will be clearly be happy the day Adobe shall make Flash open source… if we want to be fair if we say “Flash is bloody expensive” we must say “Apple’s devices are bloody expensive too”!
I love Apple, Steve Jobs is been my idol for years and still is but this choice about Flash convinced me to stay on PC’s side… if I have to pay 700€ for the latest iPhone and I cannot run Flash in it… well, I’m sorry but I’ll stay out of fashion and wait till my beloved Macbook Pro 17″ will have an accessible cost, specially in these hard times of financial crisis and lack of work!

Most people that complain and cry about Flash are usually Apple users, upset because they don’t have the option for Mobile Web. Flash offers many options already mentioned. It also offers code hiding since it’s compiled. And Flash in the form of Adobe Air is platform independent, so it can run on an Apple device as well as other devices. People that complain about Flash really are ignorant to it’s power and don’t understand that it’s not the platform that is usually the problem, it’s bad programming from developers. I develop in Flash as well as other languages like jQuery (learning mobile now as well as HTML5 for work), but if there ever came a time where I was asked to develop for Apple devices, I would be more opt to develop in Adobe Air using AS3 because once I’m done with that project, I could then port it over to Android. Not everything needs to conform to Apple, especially with the rise of Android devices appearing on the market today.

I don’t see why Apple users feel so superior, so “above it all.” They are not. Because their computers are “sexy,” they think they are better. Guess what, they are not. They are built on Intel processors because they are better and less expensive. Bottom line is if Apple were so good 90% of the population would use it. I am sick of them. Windows is usability and practicality (except for Windows 8). Android is innovation.

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